price of goods falling, and the market, perhaps, filled with unemployed labor. Under such circumstances the attempt to raise wages is necessarily a failure; while, if proper care were used to take advantage of the market, an increase of pay might often be obtained without any struggle at all.

But there is a further mistake into which laborers are apt to fall on this subject of wages: they often entertain extravagant ideas as to the extent to which wages can be raised. One would think from the talk in which some of them indulge, and from the reckless manner in which they order strikes, that they thought almost any rate could be obtained if sufficient pressure were brought to bear. Yet a little attention to the conditions of business, to commercial history, and to the state of the market at a given time, would show that any great and sudden increase of wages was out of the question. Such increase as is possible will result in part from the general moral and intellectual improvement of the laborer himself, and of his special skill as a workman, and in part from taking advantage of the various markets and of the times and seasons, so as to get the highest rate obtainable in each particular case.

Besides the mistakes above mentioned, to which the mass of the poor are liable, there are others, to which those of their number are exposed who attempt to do business on their own account. Men born in narrow circumstances have seldom much chance in early life to learn the management of business; and they need, therefore, to be specially careful in undertaking it. Yet they are very apt to enter upon it without sufficient attention to its conditions, and without the amount of capital which the business requires. Every year a multitude of small capitalists are thus wrecked; and in the majority of cases their failure is due to mistakes and imprudences which a little more care and forethought might have prevented. Doubtless one cause of such failures is the passion for great and sudden gains; a passion that afflicts multitudes in our time, and has caused the ruin of many rich men no less than of many poor. But whatever may be the cause of failure in any particular case, the result is much to be regretted, since an increase in the number of small capitalists is greatly to be desired.

Without touching here upon the subject of coöperative industry, or the means which the rich may devise for improving the condition of the poor, we have merely tried to state briefly some of the more serious economic mistakes into which poor men and those of small means are liable to fall, and which are a hindrance, and sometimes a great one, to the improvement of their lot. If, now, we are asked what remedy can be applied, we fear there is none except the slow work ing of time and education. For the purchase of goods by the poor, it has been proposed that coöperative stores should be established, so as to save for the purchasers the profit they now pay to the retail dealer. That such stores, when well conducted, are highly beneficial, there can be no doubt; but for some reason or other most enterprises of this sort in America have proved unsuccessful. On the subject of wages our native American laborers have not, as a rule, been so widely mistaken as foreign laborers and those of foreign birth; and experience will in time, no doubt, lead to more correct views and wiser methods. The

general education of the poor, bringing with it more thoughtfulness and foresight, must also in the course of time lead to greater knowledge of economic subjects and better methods of management. But something also may be done by direct advice and exhor tation.

A Ready-made Foreign Market for American Goods.

THE recent political canvass was prolific of wide differences of opinion; but we believe there is one point upon which most men of all parties are now substantially agreed, viz., the desirability of securing additional foreign markets for American goods. Many think this can best be obtained by a reduction of duties which now operate against the freedom of commerce; while others advocate the establishment by public subsidy of ocean lines, or the conversion into business agencies of our entire consular service. A commission of investigation has been appointed to visit the countries of Central and South America with a view to the extension of our trade in those quarters, and legislation of some sort may be expected to grow out of this mission. That, in a large number of cases, our manufactories are abundantly able to put out more goods than they can dispose of is disclosed by the failures from overproduction, the reduction of wages, and the ruinous competition for the home market, which are matters of daily record in the newspapers. A considerable addition to the present area of sale for American goods would in all probability not only relieve the present stringency in trade, but would put many of our manufactures upon a favorable basis for years to come.

Whatever of trade we may hereafter acquire in new markets will be based upon a demonstrated demand for our products - a demand which can only be created in the laborious course of business. In other words, the market will have to be "worked up" in strict competition with the products of other countries. Agencies must be established, samples must be shown, advertised, and tested, and patents and trade-marks secured. These labors performed, there is no lack of assurance that those who shall thus extend our material civilization will be fully protected in obtaining the legitimate profits of their labor. The agent, the owner, and the inventor will each find new rewards and a new stimulus.

There is, however, one American business which, by the neglect of Congress, has been refused the security of its legitimate profits in foreign countries. Moreover, the demand for its products is already so well established and so extensive that the industry has for years given employment to a large body of smugglers, chiefly in England, who, by underselling the market with stolen goods, have grown rich by the labors of our producers, lessening the rewards not only of these, but of those capitalists in our own country by whom the products have been set before the world. The market is there, virtually ready-made, and waiting only for Congress to say the word to enable us to occupy it. No tariff has to be repealed, no commercial agency of consuls has to be established. Nothing remains but to secure the patent which is granted with alacrity to other forms of expressing American ideas; and this Congress could accomplish in twenty minutes. The revenue which would have accrued to America had this been done fifty years ago is incalculable, but

it is secondary to the national stimulus which has been lost by this flagrant and onerous omission. The product we have in mind is American literature.

On another page we print an "Open Letter" from Mr. George Parsons Lathrop, secretary of the American Copyright League, setting forth the efforts that are now being made by that body to obtain from Congress a recognition of property in literary products equal to that which we accord to even the poorest brand of Havana cigars. We have already called attention in

these columns to the distinguished advocates, in politics and literature, of the principle embodied in the Dorsheimer Copyright Bill, which is now high up on the calendar of the House of Representatives. The bill is not open to a single partisan consideration; it has no proper relation to the tariff, and the only strife it ought to give rise to is an eager emulation on the part of representatives to see who can do the most to procure the early passage of an always just and now doubly expedient measure.

The World's Exposition at New Orleans.

ITS SCOPE AND EXPECTED RESULTS.

THE World's Exposition at New Orleans is the response to a demand that arose from most of the Southern States simultaneously - a response that had previously found partial expression in the local expositions of Atlanta and Louisville. The South her self was astonished at those exhibitions of success which had attended the labor necessitated by her defeat in the Civil War. She had been too absorbed in the struggle for existence to notice the change her energy was creating; and it was only when she had won for herself the right to a moment's rest that she looked around and saw the gratifying result of her toil.

The project of the new World's Exposition was born of a spirit of friendly rivalry with those other sections that had already proclaimed to the world their industrial development; and it was intended simply to show one phase of the country's resources. But as it was planned on an extensive scale, leading men of "the new South" saw the opportunity they had been seeking, and easily prevailed upon those having the enterprise in hand to make it neither local nor sectional, but national. The steps to this end were natural and easy. Cotton might no longer be King, but its cultivation from the seed to the bale, and its manufacture from the bale to the fabric, embraced so significant a part of the nation's industry, was so inextricably woven up with the wealth of the world, that it required no change of plan- merely an extension of idea

to

make an exposition of cotton an exposition of the world's industry. As soon as this decision was reached, the entire country came to the aid of the undertaking, and, with a spontaneity and enthusiasm which are gratefully appreciated by the Southern people, extended such pecuniary assistance and moral support as were necessary for the successful completion of so gigantic an enterprise. Such are the causes that gave birth to the Exposition and extended its original scope; but the results that may be expected to flow from it cannot be so briefly stated.

What the Southern people have accomplished since the war has not been due to emulation springing from observation of what the world beyond their borders was accomplishing. The largest proportion of her people have been and still are profoundly ignorant of the higher phases of intellectual and mechanical power

as applied to the every-day wants of life. It is true that they read in their papers and in books that there is a continual re-adaptation of the sciences to meet the changed conditions of society, that each element of nature is being utilized in some new way to satisfy some new need. But those things are to them as things in dreams. Poverty has held them to their work; and living as they do far from the centers of activity, they have not been able by even hurried glimpses of great cities to form a conception of how their surroundings could be improved. What they have done has been by untiring energy with inferior appliances. It would be unfair to say that this is true of all sections of the South. There are certain portions of it where results are reached by the same means as those used in the North; but in the majority of instances Southern energy has been handicapped by inferior methods and appliances. Add improved methods to her natural advantages and intense desire to develop herself, and there must come a prosperity unexcelled in history. And since the larger mass of her people cannot go out into the world and see things with their own eyes, the world in essence is to be brought to them. National and international expositions have heretofore been held in the great centers of population, in places needing them least. The results have, notwithstanding, been beneficial, as interchange of thoughts and sympathies must always be; but it will be difficult to foretell how largely the Southern people will be instructed by the great Object Lesson to be placed before them at New Orleans.

If these remarks hold good of even the white population, who by means of the press have kept themselves to a certain extent au courant with the progress and processes of society, what can be said of the colored population, that vast agglomeration of ignorance as yet scarcely touched by the leaven of civilization ?

If the Exposition has no other effect than that of guiding in the right direction the uncertain aspirations of this element of Southern life, the million of dollars appropriated by the National Government will be returned to it a thousand-fold. For, besides the advantages which the blacks will receive in common with the whites, a new factor has been introduced into their development, a factor so important that the World's Exposition is likely to mark an era in their history almost as significant as their emancipation from slavery. It is difficult to find at present a white Southerner who would return if he could to the ante-bellum system; still the feeling toward the colored man up to within the past two or three years has been the passive sentiment of "live and let live." The civil equality of the negro was forced upon the white man against his will; but to his credit be it said that in order to show his acquiescence in the theory of government for all the people, he has come forward and asked the colored people, as being a large component of the society of which he is himself a part, to assist him in showing to the world what the South has grown to be. The management of the Exposition have created a department devoted exclusively to an exhibition of the advancement made by the colored people within the past twenty years, and have put at the head of it a colored man who commands the confidence of the entire country. A large space has been reserved for the colored people's exhibition in the Government Building. In consequence of this, the negroes in every Southern State are alive with eager activity; and although their exhibition will probably be crude, it will be one of the most significant features of the occasion.

These are the two distinctive benefits to the South that will flow from the Exposition. There are others common to all expositions not necessary to be enumerated here; but one or two of national importance cannot be passed over. New Orleans was selected as the site for the Exposition not only because this is the natural outlet for a large proportion of Southern trade, but because the city is the natural gateway for the vast commerce that must at some time spring up between the United States and the Central and South American countries. To foster and develop that trade, the management of the Exposition have bent every energy. Although aware that New Orleans and the South would be the principal gainers, they saw that the entire country would be enriched, particularly the manufacturing and agricultural industries of the North and West. Nothing was left undone to secure the coöperation of these southern races. Commissioners were sent to interest the governments and the peoples; desirable locations were reserved in the buildings and grounds; premiums were offered to suit the demands of the exhibitors. As a result, the most intense enthusiasm has arisen among countries that had never before evinced the least inclination to participate in foreign exhibitions. Each has vied with the other in attempts to place herself in the most favorable attitude before the world; and each will keenly watch what the various commercial, industrial, and agricultural centers of the world can offer in the way of interchange. European countries have finally appreciated this fact. At first there was a positive refusal on their part to participate in the Exposition. New Orleans was a great way off, and they had been surfeited with expositions. But when they saw the unprecedented zeal of the South American countries, the feeling changed. The newspapers began to call upon the merchants and manufacturers to exert them selves, unless they wished to see their trade directed away from its former channels. And now from across the Atlantic comes information that self-interest has done what self-pride could not do, and that the European will compete with the North American in a struggle for commercial supremacy in the far South.

The Woman's Department of the Exposition is also to be national in its scope, and will yield an abundance

of good fruit to the entire country. The women of the South particularly will reap a harvest from the experience of their more fortunate sisters of the North.

To say that the Exposition will have a softening effect upon the lingering animosities of the war is to imply that such animosities still exist - an implication that the Southerner is loath to admit. There is nothing so potent as prosperity to wipe out resentment. The more prosperous the South has grown, the less disposition has she felt to dwell upon what she was wont to consider her injuries; and to-day, standing on the eve of her great festival, to which she has invited the nations of the earth, she would resent the imputation that she harbors malice against any. Doubtless, however, the Exposition will bring about a still better knowledge and higher respect among the various sections of our common country.

Recent Electrical Progress.

THE Electrical Exhibition held at Philadelphia in September and October was to many people a disappointment. Many of the international exhibitions held in the last ten years have been marked by the appearance of important inventions, as the telephone at the Centennial and the phonograph at the great exhibition at Paris. This has led to a general expectation that all important exhibitions will be signalized by the first display of some startling and wonderful discovery or invention. This is particularly true in electricity, the public mind being quite prepared to accept anything, however strange, in this field of research. It must be observed as a curious change in public opinion that while twenty years ago all inventions were received with distrust and unbelief, there is now an eagerness to welcome everything that would be to the elder inventors, like Morse or Howe, something quite bewildering. All this seemed to give to the visitors to the Philadelphia exhibition a certain sense of disappointment, while to the student this feeling was the most striking feature of the occasion.

At the same time, the exhibition was in the best sense a success and very far from disappointing, because it showed a remarkable commercial and industrial progress of the electric light. With the general introduction of dynamos for lighting appeared new mechanical problems. There must be high speed, steadiness of motion combined with ease of management. The dynamos for isolated lighting, as in a hotel, factory, or single building of any kind or on ship-board, must also be compact in design and light in weight. The steam-engines shown at the exhibition were, for this reason, quite as interesting as the lamps. No specially novel motor was exhibited, yet the effect of the demand for high speed was evident in all the types of engines in the exhibition. Even in the matter of belts for connecting engines with dynamos progress was claimed, some belting being shown specially designed to secure steadiness of motion. In brief, the improvement in engines and connections is clearly the result of the peculiar demands of the dynamo, and a new class of motors has appeared, giving high speed and uniform motion, with the utmost compactness of design. One gas-engine directly connected with a dynamo was shown as an interesting illustration of the converand the other with the tender, so that the current flows down the wheels of the locomotive, along the rails to the wheels of the tender, and through these wheels to the other wire. If now the joint between any pair of rails and the next pair is separated by some insulating material, the circuit will be broken for the instant when the wheels of the engine are on one pair of rails and the wheels of the tender on the other. This breakage of the circuit through wheels and rails may be used to ring a bell or sound the whistle. It is easy to see that a wire connected with the rail on one side of the insulated joint might be carried any distance and connected with a switch or the lock of a draw-bridge, and then carried back to the rail on the other side of the joint. In the normal position of the switch or the bridge this wire would be a closed circuit bridging the broken joint, and the engine passing the joint would not be affected. If now the switch or draw be opened, the circuit will be broken, and the current as the engine passed the joint would be interrupted and the signal made to sound. In this manner the movement of any switch, bridge, etc., could be made to signal automatically to an approaching engine while still at a considerable distance. By a reversal of the plan, the engine could be used to transmit in advance a warning of its approach. This is, however, already accomplished by other methods. The novelty appears to be in the automatic signaling to the engine by the movement of a distant switch or draw, or from any cause whatever, a washout, breakage of culvert, fire on bridge, or other accident.

The most important application of electricity to railroad work was a combined pneumatic and electric switch and signaling system. The design of this system is to control all the switches and signals at a junction by means of compressed air. The system consists essentially of a compressor and air-reservoir to supply air under considerable pressure to the pipes that extend from the signal-station to each switch and signal-post. At each switch and signal-post is placed a cylinder having a piston and piston-rod, and so arranged that the movement of the piston will control the switch or the signal. In the signal-station is an annunciator connected with distant points on each line of rails. On the approach of a train a bell is rung and the position of the train is shown by the annunciator. All the signals of the system are in their normal condition of danger, and to prepare the lines for the passage of the train hand-levers are turned and air under pressure is admitted to the cylinders controlling the proper switches and signals. This, at the same time, locks all other signals and displays on a board in the hut the exact position of every switch in the system. A full-size model of the switch and signals was shown in operation, and seemed on examination to work with certainty and precision.

Charles Barnard.

The Present State of the Copyright Movement.

THE American Copyright League was formed in May, 1883, with the object of obtaining a reform in our copyright law which should secure to foreign authors the right of property in their works in this country.

Early in the last session of Congress, Representa